A GREEN NEW DEAL IN 2019

AN IDEA WHOSE TIME HAS COME

A LOOK AT VARIOUS PLANS

For several years, our organization has felt that our
country needs a Green New Deal. So it's great that it's finally
happening now. Support is growing in the United States for a Green New
Deal. There are many different plans out there, but the Green New Deal
is broadly understood as a rapid transition to a clean energy economy
with a jobs program and a stronger social safety net. There is also an
emphasis on decarbonizing the economy.

There has been increasing international pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (like carbon and methane) after a report
came out from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stating
that humanity has just over a decade to get carbon emissions under
control before catastrophic climate change impacts become unavoidable.
(And in many ways, the damage has already been done). But there is
definitely a great need to take action before the situation gets worse.

And even China, which is currently an environmental disaster, is pushing renewable energy policies. (Truth-out). So it's time that the United States does the same.

We have posted several of the prominent groups working on a Green New
Deal plan below. The details of this need to be ironed out. But it's
great that these plans are finally being put together and publicized.

DATA FOR PROGRESS

Data for Progress is a think tank that has laid out their own vision of a green new deal.

Here are some of the goals they have stated in their report:

100% clean and renewable electricity by 2035

Zero net emissions from energy by 2050

100% net-zero building energy standards by 2030

100% zero emission passenger vehicles by 2030

100% fossil-free transportation by 2050

Making clean air and clean water a national right.

Cutting methane leakage 50% by 2025

And there are many more that can be read below in Data For Progress's full report.

ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ AND THE GREEN NEW DEAL COMMITTEE

After the 2018 midterm elections, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez launched a resolution to create a committee on the Green New Deal.

By the end of November, eighteen Democratic members of
Congress were co-sponsoring a proposed House Select Committee on a Green
New Deal, and incoming representatives Ayanna Pressley and Joe Neguse
had announced their support. Draft text would task this committee with a
detailed national, industrial, economic mobilization plan capable of
making the U.S. economy carbon neutral' while promoting economic and
environmental justice and equality, to be released in early 2020, with
draft legislation for implementation within 90 days.

JUSTICE DEMOCRATS

Justice Democrats is an American progressive political
action committee that has the goal of getting more progressive democrats
elected to Congress. The group helped engineer Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez's meteoric rise. They have supported her Green New Deal,
along with policies such as a 70% tax on the super wealthy.

Two of Justice Democrats' founders, Saikat Chakrabarti
and Corbin Trent, are senior staffers in her office. And Chakrabarti,
her chief of staff, served on the board of Justice Democrats until he
recently resigned.

THE SUNRISE MOVEMENT

A week after the 2018 midterm elections, climate justice group
Sunrise Movement organized a protest in Nancy Pelosi's office calling on
Nancy Pelosi to support a Green New Deal.

Part of The Sunrise Movement's Green New Deal plan is the following:

Expand existing renewable power sources and deploy new production
capacity with the goal of meeting 100% of national power demand through
renewable sources.

Build a national, energy-efficient, smart grid.

Upgrade every residential and industrial building for state-of-the-art energy efficiency, comfort and safety.

Eliminate greenhouse gas emissions from the manufacturing,
agricultural and other industries, including by investing in local-scale
agriculture in communities across the country.

Eliminate greenhouse gas emissions from, repairing and improving
transportation and other infrastructure, and upgrading water
infrastructure to ensure universal access to clean water.

Fund massive investment in the drawdown of greenhouse gases.

Make “green” technology, industry, expertise, products and services a
major export of the United States, with the aim of becoming the
undisputed international leader in helping other countries transition to
completely greenhouse gas neutral economies and bringing about a global
Green New Deal.

A LETTER FROM MORE THAN 600 DIFFERENT ENVIRONMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS TO CONGRESS

Recently, more than 600 organizations, mostly environmental groups,
have joined together to show their support for a "Green New Deal" in the
United States. They sent a letter to Congress detailing today's urgent climate threat, and the immediacy of the response required.

The letter sent to Congress makes the following demands:

Halt all fossil fuel leasing, phase out all fossil fuel extraction, and end fossil fuel and other dirty energy subsidies.

THE NEW CONSENSUS

A policy group is being formed to support the progressive support for a Green New Deal.

The policy group is called "The New Consensus." The
501c(3) nonprofit will provide a policy platform that will underpin a
Green New Deal. The two leaders of this group will be Desmond Drummer
and Rhiana Gunn-Wright.

Demond Drummer is an organizer and tech guru, who is also the co-founder and executive director of CoderSpace, a youth tech mentoring and education program on Chicago's South Side.

Rhiana Gunn-Wright is a Yale graduate and Rhodes
scholar. She served as a policy director for the campaign of Democrat
Abdul El-Sayed, a first-time candidate who captured the attention of
progressives across the nation in the Michigan Democratic gubernatorial
primary. El-Sayed ran on an ambitious clean energy platform that called
for a shift to all renewables by 2030.

Her LinkedIn also lists her as a design research fellow at ECMC
(Educational Credit Management Corporation), a nonprofit operating in
the area student loan bankruptcy management and loan collection.

Part of The New Consensus's plan is to do the following:

Set up a Climate Mobilization Office, ramping up funding
for the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, the Energy
Department's research arm.

Create a "Green Bank," a public bank that would be used
to invest in zero-carbon technologies under development in the public
and private sector that need to be commercialized.

Decarbonize the economy by creating green jobs

Find ways for all sectors of the U.S. Economy to benefit from a carbonless or zero-carbon economy.